he phrase “the new normal” has been thrown around since the COVID-19 pandemic began, and as America struggles to define—and design—what that is exactly, colleges are paving the way for what it might look like.

After the chaos and uncertainty of 2020, colleges and universities throughout the Baltimore region began to find their groove as they moved into the 2021-2022 school year. Coronavirus safety committees had been erected, new mandates put in place, safety protocols implemented—everything from vaccine requirements to temperature checks to quarantine procedures and wastewater testing that can pinpoint a COVID infection before anyone is symptomatic.

By some counts, colleges may very well be the safest places to live and work.

“Just following simple rules of wearing face masks and social distancing, using wastewater management and testing when we need to, we have, in many ways, been able to return to normal life,” says Goucher College President Kent Devereaux. “Full athletics, student clubs, dining in the dining hall, use of the library—everything that you’d normally have, we’ve been able to return to.”

Despite the challenges and anxieties faced by students, staff, and faculty alike, some unexpected silver linings have emerged.

“It’s just incredible to watch how it’s grown into the vision that we, as a group of students, had.”

The widespread adoption of technology across college campuses has proven to provide more flexibility, efficiency, and innovation—and even accessibility, in some cases. Counseling sessions, for example, began to be conducted remotely during the pandemic and many students found that they preferred it to in-person sessions. Students who cannot, for whatever reason, make it to an in-person class can now study from anywhere.

Challenging times, combined with advances in technology and the general acceptance of it, have also brought more cooperation and collaboration among schools. It’s becoming more common, for example, for schools that offer complementary programs to partner with one another to offer students an educational pathway to continue studies in their chosen areas. That may mean a discounted tuition rate, a transfer of class credits, or an internship through a partner school.

Maybe most importantly though, schools, at their best, foster an environment where students are supported, expand who they are, and connect with like-minded people. At a time when gathering together is not always safe, being in a community has become even more precious, and students have found new ways to connect.

OCA Mocha, a coffeehouse in Arbutus founded by University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) students, is one example of how effective a gathering place can be at a time when people are craving human connection. What started as a class assignment—to design a community center of some sort—has become a gathering place not just for UMBC students and alumni, but the Arbutus community at large.

“We’ve heard a lot of stories from people who are extremely grateful to have this space,” says Michael Berardi, UMBC class of 2019 and co-founder and general manager of OCA Mocha, which stands for Opportunities for Community Alliances. The coffee shop includes a stage, a community room, and an art gallery, employs UMBC students and alumni, and provides internship opportunities for current UMBC students.

“We have local groups and organizations that meet regularly in our community space and are grateful to not have to meet in someone’s living room or church basement,” says Berardi. “We see a lot of connections being made. It’s just incredible to watch how it’s grown into the vision that we, as a group of students, had.”

We checked in with colleges and universities throughout the region to find out what’s new and what campus life and classes look like, two years into the pandemic.

COPPIN STATE UNIVERSITY
A historically Black institution founded in 1900, Coppin State University is situated in the heart of Baltimore City in the Mondawmin neighborhood. Part of the University System of Maryland in Baltimore, the school offers 32 undergraduate and 11 graduate degrees, along with nine certificate programs and one doctorate degree. It’s been rated No. 4 Best HBCU in the Nation (College Consensus), the Top 5 Best Value Online Program (Online School Center), and No. 17 Best Value in the Nation (College Consensus).

In the summer of 2021, CSU announced its Student Debt Relief Initiative, which clears roughly $1 million in student balances and provided a $1,200 credit to every student enrolled in the fall 2021 semester. CSU also created the Freddie Gray Student Success Scholarship, which is available to graduates of Carver Vocational-Technical High School, where Gray was a student.

Coppin also takes esports (competitive video gaming) seriously. In the fall of 2021, Coppin became the first HBCU to open a building on campus exclusively devoted to esports. The Premier Esports Lab opened in September with a guest appearance from Grammy-nominated artist Cordae.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 2,383 undergraduates, 341 graduates
• STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 13:1
• ANNUAL TUITION: $6,809 in-state, $13,334 out-of-state
• ACCEPTANCE RATE: 40%
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Nursing, Business, Biology, Education, and Criminal Justice, Rehabilitation Counseling

DICKINSON COLLEGE
Founded in 1783, Dickinson College is a liberal arts college in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, with a suburban campus that spans 144 acres. The school offers 41 undergraduate degrees within 17 fields of study.

It’s been rated as one of the best schools in the country for its sustainability efforts, which include an 80-acre, USDA-certified organic farm. Princeton Review rated it No. 2 in the Top 50 Green Colleges, and it was rated No. 2 in Overall Top Performers among baccalaureate institutions in the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education’s “Sustainable Campus Index” in 2019 and 2020.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 2,345
• STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 9:1
• ANNUAL TUITION: $58,708
• ACCEPTANCE RATE: 52%
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: International Business, Economics, Political Science & Government, International Relations & National Security, General Psychology

GETTYSBURG COLLEGE
Gettysburg College, a private, liberal arts school, sits on 225 acres adjacent to the historical Gettysburg Battlefield in Pennsylvania. Many of the buildings on campus are historically significant, so it’s no wonder that it draws students interested in studying history.

The school offers 65 academic programs, more than 120 campus clubs and organizations, and 800 events on campus each year, plus more than 100 study-abroad opportunities open to students.

Its Majestic Theater serves as a venue for the greater Gettysburg community, hosting national acts as well as performances by the school’s Sunderman Conservatory of Music students.

It’s ranked No. 12 for “students who study the most” by the Princeton Review, which also ranked Gettysburg College’s dining hall No. 9 in the country for best campus food.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 2,600
• STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 10:1
• ANNUAL TUITION: $59,960
• ACCEPTANCE RATE: 56%
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Political Science, Economics, Health Sciences, Organization and Management Studies, History, Psychology

GOUCHER COLLEGE
A private, liberal arts college in Towson, Goucher College prides itself on its close-knit community.

Goucher was extremely proactive when it came to COVID-19 precautions, being the first in the state to implement wastewater testing, which is able to isolate COVID infections by dorm.

Also of note: The college recently opened two new residence halls as part of the school’s First-Year Village. One hundred percent of Goucher students study abroad, and the school is committed to sustainability.

Most recently, Goucher has begun exciting partnerships with other schools, such as Johns Hopkins University, Loyola University, and more to come, to provide a pathway for students to continue their education beyond Goucher. For instance, their 4+1 MBA Program allows students to earn an advanced business degree through Loyola via a “Fast Track” admission process, and at a 15% discount on tuition.

SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 1,100
STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 9:1
ANNUAL TUITION: $48,000
ACCEPTANCE RATE: 79%
POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Psychology, International Relations, Economics, Political Science, Business Administration

JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Johns Hopkins University (JHU) offers nine academic divisions and hundreds of courses of study, with campuses spread throughout Baltimore, including the Peabody Institute, a music and dance conservatory in Mount Vernon. Its main Homewood campus is located on North Charles Street.

The prestigious, world-renowned university has a strong reputation for its public health and medical studies and has been compared to Ivy League schools.

One of its points of pride is its financial aid program, which covers 100% of calculated need for every admitted student, without loans. This means JHU works with families to calculate what they can afford to contribute toward the total cost of attendance—including meals, books, travel, and other expenses—and JHU covers the rest with grants that don’t need to be repaid.

This school year, JHU added two new minors: Latin American Studies and Writing Seminars.

It also announced new efforts this year to move toward a broader, more flexible undergraduate educational experience that will include a required first-year seminar and the streamlining of major requirements to allow for greater intellectual exploration.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 6,333 undergraduates, 22,559 graduates
• STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 6:1
• ANNUAL TUITION: $56,313 for Peabody Institute, $58,720 for the School of Engineering and the School of Arts and Sciences
• ACCEPTANCE RATE: 9%
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Computer Science, Molecular and Cellular Biology, Neuroscience, Economics, Public Health Studies, International Studies

LOYOLA UNIVERSITY
This private, Jesuit institution offers undergraduate and graduate programs on a beautiful urban campus in northern Baltimore City. Education at Loyola is based in the Jesuit tradition of scholarship cura personalis, or care for the whole person. Loyola is known for its academic rigor while helping students lead purposeful lives. Seventy percent of students study abroad. It currently ranks fourth in best universities in the North region according to U.S. News & World Report.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 3,787 undergraduates, 1,353 graduates
• STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 12:1
• ANNUAL TUITION: $53,430
• ACCEPTANCE RATE: 80%
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Business, Management, Marketing, Journalism, Social Sciences, Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Psychology, English Language and Literature, Engineering and Education.

McDANIEL COLLEGE
McDaniel College sits in a bucolic setting near Westminster in Carroll County. The private, four-year liberal arts college offers more than 70 undergraduate programs of study and more than 20 graduate programs. McDaniel’s most recent addition to its curriculum is a National Security Fellows Program that provides students with knowledge, skills, and experience in national security as well as the ability to specialize in an area of interest, such as interstate conflict, intrastate political violence, cybersecurity, ethics, and human rights.

Also new this year, McDaniel appointed an inaugural associate provost for equity and belonging who provides vision and leadership to the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and works in collaboration with the provost to co-lead the college’s diversity, equity, and inclusion administrative committee, and guides the Bias Education Response Support Team.

The school also launched a new STEM Center to serve as a physical hub to support students studying the sciences. It hosts workshops and other events while also supplying online and hybrid support.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 1,757 undergraduates, 1,324 graduates
• STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 13:1
• ANNUAL TUITION: $46,336
• ACCEPTANCE RATE: 81%
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Kinesiology, Business Administration, Psychology, Biology, Political Science, International Studies

MORGAN STATE UNIVERSITY
The largest of Maryland’s HBCU’s (Historically Black Colleges and Universities), Morgan is a public institution founded in 1867. It is situated in northeast Baltimore. As a Carnegie-classified high research (R2) institution, Morgan provides instruction to a multiethnic, multiracial, multinational student body and offers more than 140 academic programs at undergraduate and graduate levels. As Maryland’s Preeminent Public Urban Research University, Morgan fulfills its mission to address the needs and challenges of the modern urban environment through intense community level study and pioneering solutions.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 6,270 undergraduates, 1,364 graduates
• STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 15:1
• ANNUAL TUITION: $8,008 for in-state and $18,480 for out-of-state
• ACCEPTANCE RATE: 73%
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Civil Engineering, Communications Engineering, Business Administration and Management, Social Work, Biology/Biological Sciences, Architecture, Finance, Psychology, Sociology

NOTRE DAME OF MARYLAND UNIVERSITY
A private, Catholic liberal arts university in northern Baltimore, Notre Dame of Maryland University offers programs from undergraduate through PhD, as well as Maryland’s only women’s college. It recently launched the first master’s of art degree in Art Therapy program in the state.
The beautiful, wooded campus is just steps from the bustling downtown Baltimore culture. With values rooted in Catholicism, the school focuses on service to others and social responsibility.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 783
• STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 7:1
• ANNUAL TUITION: $39,675
• ACCEPTANCE RATE: 88%
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Nursing, Education, Biology, Art Therapy, Pharmacy

TOWSON UNIVERSITY
One of the largest public universities in the state, Towson University offers more than 60 undergraduate majors and continues to draw students from other states, though it remains part of the University System of Maryland.

Its campus continues to expand, with a huge new dining hall, a 23,000-foot recreation and fitness facility with an indoor swimming pool, and its 5,200-seat arena for sporting events and concerts. In 2021, it opened its new Science Complex, the largest academic building on campus at 320,000 square feet.

In September, Towson opened its StarTUp at the Armory, a space for startups and new businesses to engage with the broader community and larger businesses. It serves as a home to Towson’s entrepreneurship programs, as well as student competitions and events.

While Towson remains the largest supplier of medical professionals and educators in the state, the university has also built a strong reputation for its College of Fine Arts and Communication, as well as its Asian Arts & Culture Center, both of which bring students into the wider community and the Baltimore community to Towson for enriching performing arts, music, and visual art programs.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 17,907 undergraduates, 2,949 graduates
• STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 16:1
• ANNUAL TUITION: $7,100 in-state, $22,152 out-of-state
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Business Administration, Education, Nursing, Exercise Science, Psychology, Sociology and Anthropology, Biology, Computer Science, Information Technology

UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND, BALTIMORE
University of Maryland, Baltimore is Maryland’s only public health, law, and human services university. Located in downtown Baltimore, it offers 86 degree and certificate programs through its six nationally ranked professional schools—dentistry, law, medicine, nursing, pharmacy, and social work—and an interdisciplinary graduate school.

The school’s 14-acre BioPark is Baltimore’s biggest biotechnology cluster, employing 1,000 people, and remains on the cutting edge of new drugs, treatments, and medical devices.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 7,244
• ANNUAL TUITION: Varies by school
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Medicine, Law, Dentistry, Pharmacy, Nursing, Social Work

UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND, BALTIMORE COUNTY
University of Maryland, Baltimore County educates a campus of more than 10,000 students in programs spanning the arts, engineering, information technology, humanities, sciences, preprofessional studies, and social sciences. Located on the edge of Baltimore County, it allows easy access into the city and all the conveniences of suburban life and housing. It also offers plenty of opportunities for study abroad.

In the fall of 2021, UMBC opened the Center for Well-Being, a new two-story complex that houses Retriever Integrated Health, Student Conduct and Community Standards, and i3b’s Gathering Space for Spiritual Well-Being. UMBC’s already significant NASA partnerships have continued to grow. In October, NASA announced a major award of $72 million over three years for the new Goddard Earth Sciences Technology and Research II center. UMBC is leading the national consortium and will receive over $38 million. The GESTAR II consortium will support over 120 researchers, creating extensive opportunities for breakthroughs in Earth and atmospheric science research, and providing major opportunities for students to conduct research and be mentored by NASA scientists and engineers.

• SIZE OF STUDENT BODY: 13,638
• STUDENT TO FACULTY RATIO: 17:1
• ANNUAL TUITION: $12,280 in-state, $28,470 out-of-state
• ACCEPTANCE RATE: 81%
• POPULAR AREAS OF STUDY: Computer and Information Sciences and Support Services, Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Social Sciences, Psychology, Visual and Performing Arts

Cited tuition costs exclude room and board and books.

A few weeks ago, a friend texted Baltimore activist Kelly Cross a photo of an advertisement for the shuttered Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, urging people to come visit what has since been turned into a tourist attraction. The irony, as Cross notes, is that the ad in question is about six blocks away from the Baltimore City Detention Center, located off Interstate 83 in the Mount Vernon area.

Recently, plans were announced surrounding its demolition, along with a proposed subsequent substance abuse and mental health rehabilitation center for inmates in its place. Cross and other critics of the move see a grander vision for what could be done with the space—a Philadelphia-like model, for instance.

“It seems a lot of times Baltimoreans are just somehow willing to allow things to happen that should not or would not happen in other cities,” Cross says. “Nowadays you don’t put a massive correctional facility smack dab in the middle of your town.”

It’s important to note that those who might criticize this decision take issue with the location in which it’s happening, and not necessarily the practice itself. Before it was closed, the Baltimore City Detention Center held inmates serving short sentences and those awaiting trial. It’s a building that dates back to the Civil War, and there is a historical preservation angle that objectors feel is being ignored. Cross sees ways to capitalize on the city’s history and turn a jail with a less-than-storied history into a net positive.

“It’s a massive lost opportunity,” Cross says. “There are plenty of other places in the city that don’t have the same strategic and economic value to the viability of Baltimore where you can have those activities. There are facilities where these people can be held and these services can be administered. That’s a laudable goal and we can find plenty of places to do that, but taking demolishing irreplaceable history to make that happen—that’s where I start scratching my head.”

The other side of this, of course, is what is going to be done with the space. While there is dissent, there is not much contention with the idea of doing what is best for prisoners.

“One of the real tragedies of our system, when it gets overcrowded, is that the vast majority of people that were in this detention center were awaiting trial,” says Dr. Gary LaFree, professor and chair of the University of Maryland’s Criminology & Criminal Justice Department. “They hadn’t been convicted yet. If ever there were a group of people that you would want to isolate from the worst problems of prison it would be this group. Particularly for this population, an emphasis on rehabilitation or humane treatment is especially important.”

LaFree acknowledges Cross’ side of the argument, that yes, perhaps there are better uses for a specific facility than another prison or rehabilitation center. “Obviously it’s not as positive as a recreation center or a library,” he says. “Prisons are not the whole solution to [crime problems in Baltimore], but I think they might be regarded as part of the solution.”

Another side to this debate are the questions surrounding building another center at all. Prisons are expensive to maintain and run, and building another one brings about reservations regarding utility and whether a reconstruction on this site is a viable solution.

“It’s a situation where I think the best evidence suggests that prisons do have an impact on reducing crime, but they come at a pretty high cost,” LaFree says. There is some evidence that our incarceration rates have been falling and we’re not seeing a rise in crime.”

Ultimately, nothing has been done yet, and while plans have been announced, Cross is hopeful that he might be able to appeal to the powers that be and get those in charge to see things his way.

“There are lots of places to help prisoners,” Cross says. “It’s not like we’re some landlocked city where we don’t have plenty of available land to help prisoners. I think it’s about taking the path of least resistance.”

By projecting movies on buildings or piers, Baltimore has developed a summer tradition of hosting movies in the fresh air. While the city continues to add to the history of free summer movies, there is a new celebration going on this season.

Eddie’s of Roland Park will show Wallace and Gromit and Jaws outside of its Charles Street and Roland Ave. locations to celebrate the store’s 75th anniversary. Founded in 1944 by the late Victor Cohen, the store has become beloved for its specialty food and locally inspired sandwiches. Still family owned, it is now led by second- and third-generation family members.

“Chances are, if you’re a fan of Eddie’s of Roland Park, you’re also a fan of food,” says marketing director Jared Earley. “So it’s not a far leap to assume we can all identify with the cheese-obsessed Wallace and Gromit, or the insatiable appetite of a monstrously ‘hangry’ fish.”

But that’s just one of many movie series gracing the walls and screens of Baltimore institutions this summer. Mark your calendar for these film fanatic events.

Eddie’s of Roland Park Celebrates 75 Years: Bring a chair or blanket and head to Eddie’s of Roland Park for a free neighborhood screening of films. At dusk, the independent grocer will encourage the community to join them in celebration of its 75th anniversary. Store hours will be extended and refreshments will be available for purchase inside. Free. July 17-18, July 24-25.

Mt. Vernon Movies: The picturesque Mount Vernon Place is the ideal backdrop to escape into cinema. First up is the wildly popular Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, followed next month by the Hitchcock classic Rear Window, and concluding with favorite fantasy film Labyrinth. As an added bonus, MVP will offer free popcorn. Free. June 27, July 26, August 22, 7:30-11 p.m.

Federal Hill Flicks: Visit The American Visionary Art Museum for Flicks from the Hill, which projects outdoor movies every Thursday night during July and August. The Hughes Family Outdoor Theater puts on a show with a 30-foot screen that you have to see from the massive hill to believe. Come early for free admission to the museum before the main feature at 9 p.m., which this year includes family favorites Coraline and Mrs. Doubtfire. Free. July-August, 9 p.m.

The Wine Bin Screenings: Wine Wednesdays have been moved to Saturdays. Join the Wine Bin for a sip and a flick June through September. Every Saturday, the outdoor movie series opens up parking 90 minutes before the show for drive-in style viewing. After that fills up, there is still plenty of room for to set up camping chairs and blankets. This summer is filled with a wide range of films including A Star Is Born and Beauty And The Beast. Free. June-September, 9 p.m.

Fells Point Films: Another year of films on the pier starts up on July 10 with a showing of a childhood classic—The Princess Bride. Bring your own chairs, wine, and food to turn this event into a romantic date or a night out with friends. Take part in this weekly, Wednesday event through August and enjoy other movies like Oceans 8 or Captain Marvel. Free. July 10-August 28, 8:30 p.m.

Lakefront Summer Shows: What better setting for an outdoor event than Columbia’s idyllic Lake Kittamaqundi. Check out a different movie every Monday and Friday this summer, including Disney’s Tangled and the Avengers blockbusters. Free. Through September 7, 8:30 p.m.

Bel Air Airings: Join The Bel Air Downtown Alliance for fun, film, and—now—food. For the first time, summer movie nights include Bel Air’s only food truck rally. Try some local fare from the trucks parked along Lee Street from 5-8 p.m. Six times a year, the community comes together to watch family-friendly movies like Incredibles 2 and Trolls under the stars. These movies are not only free, but also come with popcorn and face painting. Free. June-August, Sunset.

Moonlight Movie Series: Spend time with the whole family this summer in the parking lot of the Shops at Kenilworth. Every other Monday from June 24-August 19, enjoy a movie playing at sunset in the open air, including animated features like Minions, Zootopia, and Inside Out. Free. Sunset.

Merriweather Movie Nights: Normally, you would catch your favorite band at Merriweather Post Pavilion, but now you can enjoy the lawn throughout the summer with its movie nights in Columbia. After kicking off the series in May with a Sound of Music sing-a-long, the next showing is Smallfoot on July 7. The film will be screened on the lawn, so grab a blanket and friends to join the fun. In the event of rain, the movie will be screened inside the pavilion. $10. May 25, July 7, August 16, 5:30-8 p.m.

Pics in the Park: Join the Downtown Partnership of Baltimore for feature film night, on select Saturdays in June through August on the lawn in downtown’s Center Plaza. Movies begin at sunset, but exact start times will be posted on the event’s Facebook page on movie nights. The plaza is bike-, stroller-, and pet-friendly and movie-goers are encouraged to bring a picnic, lawn chairs, and blankets. Free. Times vary.

For 80 years, there was a building with 57 beds, open 24 hours a day, on the 1100 block of North Calvert Street. But the Booth House Emergency Shelter by The Salvation Army will finally close its doors on July 2.

Roughly 15 families housed at the shelter have been relocated in shelters and low-income housing throughout the area, according to Maj. Gene Hogg, the commander for the Central Maryland division of The Salvation Army. The decision to move away from temporary housing was a few years coming, he said.

It was the result of “a culmination of things,” Hogg said. After losing government funding in 2016 and falling short of the budget, The Salvation Army no longer felt that the Booth House was accomplishing its mission.

“We had been operating on a pretty stagnant budget since then,” Hogg said. “The Salvation Army began to take a look at moving toward more [long-term] programs.”

Originally, The Booth House, like most other Salvation Army housing programs, was designed to help the homeless population help themselves. It provided not only warm beds and three meals a day, but also services like job assistance, financial advice, and classes in parenting and nutrition.

“I think we’ve accomplished a great deal—we changed many lives,” Hogg said. “But when focuses change and funders change we have to be willing to adapt to that as well.”

Adapt they had to, when in 2016 the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) started to direct funds toward permanent housing programs instead. After losing $155,000 of HUD money, the Booth House could no longer mandate their additional services.

“People were opting out of all of those programs,” Hogg said. “We felt like that wasn’t accomplishing our mission. Our mission was to bring people to self-sufficiency, not just to warehouse them.”

The funding diversion also led to an initiative called Pathway of Hope, which places stronger emphasis on taking action to break the root cause of poverty, offering long-term solutions instead of temporary fixes. For the Booth House, it became all the more clear that money dedicated to operating the shelter would be better spent helping families in Baltimore become financially stable for years to come.

“Over the next couple of years we’re going to be working with the city to answer, ‘What’s the next step? How should we do it?’” Hogg said. “Those are questions that are going to take a long time to answer. But eventually we’re going to have a place where people can call home.”

After five years as one of the anchors in the burgeoning Station North Arts and Entertainment District, Red Emma’s—Baltimore’s favorite worker-owned bookstore, café, restaurant, and event space—is moving back to Mount Vernon.

Kate Khatib, a Red Emma’s co-founder, said the bookstore coffeehouse hopes to open in the former home of Spike & Charlie’s at Preston and Cathedral streets by early September. The new location is essentially seven blocks south on Maryland Avenue and the protected bike lane there. It allow Red Emma’s to double the size of its bookstore (to 1,500 titles) and offer a seated dining option (small plate-based options) while still providing a versatile space for its readings, film screenings, panel discussions, and spoken word performances.

“We have absolutely loved being on North Avenue these past five years—we couldn’t imagine a better neighborhood to grow and develop our worker cooperative,” Khatib said, adding that making the decision to move has been a difficult process. “While we’ve managed to achieve some of our goals as a project since moving, we’ve struggled to recapture the cozy community feel of our original location, and, at the same time, have outgrown the capabilities of the cafe space we designed back in 2013.”

The new venue, with two floors and a street-level bar, will offer Red Emma’s an opportunity to grow its restaurant while also enabling the coffee and bookstore to return to the cozy basement-level vibe of its original Mt. Vernon home on St. Paul Street. At their current North Avenue address, having the coffee shop, bookstore, dining area and event space all in one large open area proved challenging at times.

The ability to divide the multi-purposed operation onto different floors and into distinct spaces will make everything more efficient, Khatib added. “We still want to have big events where we have 150 people come. But sometimes a room that holds 20 or 30 is better environment other things.”

Other changes include doubling the size of the bookstore, offering a seated dinner option, featured a dedicated gluten-free fryer, adding a full bar, and offering 10 more worker-owner track jobs, bring the Red Emma’s staff to a total of 35. Owners also said they want to strengthen their “commitment to creating and sustaining an inclusive gathering place with regular pay-what-you-want-nights and family-style dinners.”

Prior to hosting Spike & Charlie’s, the 9,000-square-foot building at 1225 Cathedral Street served as home to a jazz club run by Baltimore legend Ethel Ennis. “Our cooperative is increasingly owned by young black and brown women, queer, and trans folks,” Khatib said. “There’s a connection there to a hidden history of entrepreneurialism that’s really meaningful for us.”

For the immediate future, Red Emma’s will be open at its current location, Wednesdays through Sundays, through the end of June. They will closed for moving in July and August before opening in their new location.

If you’ve walked down the 700 block of Calvert Street in Mount Vernon recently, you may have noticed that Center Stage is undergoing quite a transformation.

What was once a dark brick lobby is now a luminous entrance, painted gleaming white and featuring a new box office and cafe. There are even more architectural changes hidden from street view, including the redesigned, fourth-floor Head Theater—which boasts a high-ceilinged, naturally lit lobby of its own—and a new costume shop and a studio for education and community programming.

These changes echo a new emphasis in Center Stage’s mission, says Artistic Director Kwame Kwei-Armah—to make the 54-year-old state theater of Maryland more accessible to everyone.

“When I arrived [in 2011], I found that, architecturally, the building was just not welcoming. You had to go through the side door to get to the box office, which had bulletproof windows. The board of trustees and I wanted a structure that built upon its historic roots but opened itself out, that breathed a little more, that was brighter,” says Kwei-Armah. The purpose of the renovation is “to look after those who have been loyal supporters of Center Stage, but also for those who will be new to it.”

The $28 million project—which also includes needed infrastructure updates to the electrical, HVAC, and plumbing systems—is unprecedented in the theater company’s history. It will be unveiled March 3 with a grand re-opening that coincides with this season’s second production, The White Snake.

One aspect of the renovation that Kwei-Armah is particularly excited about is an intimate 99-seat stage called The Third Space, which is also on the fourth floor. He anticipates using that theater for newer, more experimental works.

“We hope that this space will be attractive to theatergoers in their 20s and 30s, the ones who are looking for challenges in content,” Kwei-Armah says. “It’s really about how we can make sure we offer work for everyone.”

The additional areas will put Center Stage in an elite group, as it will be only one of a handful of the country’s regional theaters to have three spaces, says J. Wynn Rousuck, former theater critic for The Sun and current theater critic at WYPR.

“This renovation will take Center Stage to a whole new level of possibility,” she says, adding that she believes the enthusiasm surrounding the project will trickle down to other local theater companies. “Baltimore’s theater scene is just burgeoning,” she says. “I’ve never seen it as vibrant as it is now.”